Meeting on stage
by Naoki Ichigo
Summary: After being thrown out by his team, Su Muqiu went to Ye Xiu. Since there was nothing he could do for about a year, he decided to spend this time with his friend. Together with Ye Xiu he causes trouble in the new server, therewith unknowingly preparing for his comeback. As if Muqiu would give up the stage so soon! And as if Ye Xiu would cause a ruckus just for the fun of it!
1. Chapter 1

It was a cold and windy night, when Su Muqiu left the club building of team Excellent Era. It was the coldest night of the year, when Su Muqiu left his former team and his beloved sister behind. It was a cold and silent night, when he was tossed on the street with nothing more on him than his clothes. It was a winter night, when he waved goodbye to his crying sister and down the snowy pavement.  
All of this wasn't surprising at all. He had anticipated it a long time ago, yet he still had hoped to make it through the whole season. Unfortunately, he was forced to stop halfway. He had been forced into retirement. For one year he would not be able to play Glory professionally. It would be a lie, if he said it didn't bother him. Honestly, it hurt like hell, to be treated like this and to have to wait one year to be able to come back. The worst was the fact that it was a friend, at least he had considered them friends, who was behind all this and that he had to leave his sister behind in the wolf's den.  
Despite what just had happened, he hoped that his former team would now get back on their feet again. The reason team Excellent Era had performed so horribly in the last years, was because of the lack in teamwork and the scheming of the higher-ups. Although he had been the one, who brought them their Glory, he was now seen as a thorn in their side that had to be removed no matter what – even when that meant losing matches. Glory was not a single player game, one could only win as a team. He was only one person and not a team, so there was nothing he could do. His own performance was as great as ever, but the teams loses overshadowed him and people started to think he was not good enough anymore.  
Now he was walking down the pavement properly disguised, otherwise his fans may recognize him and this was the last he wanted to happen. Although he had barely partaken in any sponsoring, his face was still known by the fans – maybe only at the second glance, but they would recognize him in the end. At this moment he was quite happy that he wasn't like Su Mucheng, who really was recognized even by people that did not care about games and Glory. She was a real celebrity – at least more than he was. His name was more well-known than his face.

After checking that no car was coming, Muqiu crossed the street and slipped into the Internet Café there. Unexpectedly the Internet Café was crowded. Not that this was strange for an Internet Café in general, however after secretly paying some visits every now and then, Muqiu had a relative good understanding of the popularity of this Internet Café. Was something special happening tonight? Or was there an event going on? Well, whatever it was, he would find out soon anyway.  
Muqiu made his way to the reception. No one was cared about him being here. The man behind the reception was around Muqiu's age. His face was pale, as if it had never seen the sunlight, and his eyes looked tired. A cigarette hung between his lips. Wasn't it a bit too early for him to be here?  
"Computer?", the other man asked with his eyes glued to the screen in front of him.  
"Yeah, that would be great. Maybe one in a dark, isolated corner?", Muqiu answered cheerfully, what earned him the attention of the other one.  
"Muqiu?"  
"Yep."  
"Why are you here? You're quite early today", the other one remarked.  
"And you are quite early as well. Your shift hasn't started yet, but you're still sitting here. Or have you changed shifts? You should have told be beforehand. What if I had come over later and some stranger would welcome me? You're so irresponsible!", Muqiu jokingly complained.  
"Someone got sick, so we had to improvise."  
To have a better look at the current situation in the Internet Café, the other man stood up from his chair and looked around. Costumers everywhere and he knew it wouldn't get any better today.  
"Sit down here", he said, while he pushed back the chair next to him. "This might not be a dark and isolated corner, but at least I can have an eye on you and call the police or the ambulance, when your fans come at you. You should have stayed in the club for tonight. It's quite dangerous now that so many Glory fans are around."  
With a soft laughter Muqiu went behind the reception and sat down in the offered chair.  
"It's fine. No one has discovered me until now. So I think, I am fine. Just don't use me to do your work!"

Muqiu was sure that the other man, Ye Xiu, understood that something was not alright with him, but was considerate enough to not ask any questions. As soon as Excellent Era made their announcement of their captain's retirement, the other one would know everything anyway. Tonight Muqiu didn't want to think about anything related to Excellent Era or the Professional Alliance. Just because he understood his former team somehow, didn't mean that he wasn't hurt. Yet what to do next was a thought for tomorrow. Now he would play a bit with his friends in the tenth server – although he had to make a new account and level it up. His previous account was the property of club Excellent Era, thus he had to leave it behind. The same applied for his other server accounts. However, he should have some accounts for the first to third server that belonged to him somewhere in his former room. Mucheng would take good care of them for now.  
After sitting down, Muqiu put his right hand into his pocket to get an account card, just to realize that he had none with him. Within less than a second he had completely forgotten that his cards were back at Excellent Era. Maybe because he was so used to have one with him all the time, his brain couldn't wrap itself around the thought of not having a card at hand. Letting out a sigh he leant back into his chair. What a great evening. Now he couldn't even play Glory, this was probably the worst that could happen to him.  
Muqiu's left hand went up to his temple. If this was going on any longer, he would get a headache. Was he really that old? Was he really that forgetful? Did his expulsion really affect him that much?  
"What's wrong?", Ye Xiu asked.  
He looked worried. The way he looked, Muqiu was convinced that he already knew everything. Well, it wasn't that strange, since Muqiu had told the other one about the conflict between team Excellent Era and him, so all the other one had to do was putting one and one together. Never before had Muqiu come over before Ye Xiu's shift started. Whenever he came over, he had an account card with him. Muqiu without account card was impossible! But now he was here, long before nine o'clock, without an account card. One really didn't need to be a genius to understand, what was going on.  
"I left my account cards behind", Muqiu admitted.  
He sounded as if he wanted to cry over this fact. And in some way he actually wanted to cry about it. How should he play Glory now?  
"Here, take this one."  
Ye Xiu passed him an account card.  
"Don't tell me you have forgotten what day we have. In a few hours the new server will be opened. You should start over there. Built up our guild, annoy the big guilds and meet up with the rest of us in the Heavenly Domain", he explained when he saw Muqiu's confused expression, when taking at the passed card.  
"Ah, so that's why so many people are here tonight. Good to know and good for the business. But what about you guys? Won't you come to the new server as well? It will be boring without you."

The new server would open as soon as the third of December would start. Today was the second of December. In about an hour Ye Xiu's original shift would start, then it was another three hours until midnight, which was the start for the new server. Consequently, Muqiu had four hours to fill without Glory.  
"Um… I will tell the others to come over to the new server, if they want and have time. By the way, have you already eaten something?"  
One could think that Ye Xiu was worried about his friend, which he indeed was to a certain extent, but he mostly wanted to other one to get some food for them, since he himself was too lazy and occupied with Glory, to get something.  
"I haven't, but I am also not hungry", Muqiu replied.  
However when he saw his friends expression, he understood the real meaning of his friend's words. With a sigh he stood up, he had nothing better to do right now anyway.  
"Anything specific you want?", he asked.  
"No. Just the usual."  
Without looking at Muqiu, Xiu got some money out of his pocket and gave it to Muqiu. Between the bank notes was a coupon. Muqiu took a look at it, just to make sure it wasn't expired. Wouldn't be the first time. Ever since Muqiu started to pay this Internet Café a visit from time to time, he had bought Ye Xiu something to eat every now and then, because the latter had to stay at work. Sometimes Muqiu felt a bit dumb doing so, since the other one could eat something before the shift started, but in the end, he never complaint or refused. It wasn't worth it. Truth be told, he also liked it in a strange way to come back and see his friend's happy face, when bringing back the wanted food. Also they always shared it with each other – and sharing food was something Muqiu actually enjoyed a lot, as long as he shared with people close to him.  
"Ah, maybe you could get me one of those toy figure they have right now", Ye Xiu suddenly said.  
"What?"  
Toy figures? Seriously?  
"Yeah, you know at the moment they sell Glory figures. I guess it depends on where you are, but the McDonalds across should have your team's main roster avatars. So, get me one of them."  
This was a joke, right? The other side just tried to mess with him!  
"Alright, a toy figure for the old man."  
"You can get yourself one as well."  
No, definitely not! Muqiu may be a child at heart, but he was definitely not into toy figures anymore. Never had been in the first place. Mucheng like these kind of things, so maybe he should get one for her?  
"I am going now."  
And so Muqiu left the Internet Café to get something to eat and a toy figure.


	2. Chapter 2

Inside the fast food restaurant Muqiu felt like being squeezed to death. This place was so crowded! The Internet Café was across the street from the club building of team Excellent Era, so many Excellent Era fans would go there – hoping they to bump into one of their idols. A few steps further was the McDonalds, in which Muqiu feared for his life. Logically having team Excellent Era's main roster avatars as figures would cause many fans of the team to come over, especially since the team wasn't that far away. Hell would break loose, if the people knew that team Excellent Era's captain – pardon, former captain – was waiting in the line right now! Luckily no one knew or paid attention to Muqiu.  
Never in his life had he thought that he would spent almost an hour in the waiting line, but now it just had happened. When getting back on the street, he let out a sigh and then hurried back to the Internet Café. Poor Ye Xiu must be starving by now! During his time waiting to get to the counter, Muqiu also started to feel hungrier with every passing second.

When entering the Internet Café, he saw that Ye Xiu was busy with dealing with the costumers. Some wanted a computer, some wanted to pay and leave. While he had been out, more people had come and now the small Internet Café looked as if there was no space left. It was amazing how popular Glory was, even after so many years. There were still about three hours left until the new server would open. Maybe it was because of Ye Xiu's Lord Grim that people were so hyped? Were they hoping for another miracle? Hoping that Lord Grim would come to the new server? Or that someone like Lord Grim would appear? Well, they weren't that wrong. If Muqiu started in the new server, things would be very similar to what had happened in the previous one. How could a bunch of guild experts compete with a god? With the expert amongst the experts? The god amongst gods? His opponents always had struggled against him. How could the guilds go against someone, who even caused other gods to tense up? Muqiu would feel sorry, if he cared.  
He sneaked behind the counter and sat down in the empty chair next to Ye Xiu. Those who regularly come to the Internet Café around this time, where used to Muqiu by now. They didn't know his name, so to them he was just the nice strange with questionable fashion choices. In case, they needed something from him or where talking about him, they always used his tenth server account name. Calling someone by their account name wasn't uncommon. Even Ye Xiu was mostly called Lord Grim by the costumers, although most of them knew his name – at least his last name. When Ye Xiu was just One Autumn Leaf, Muqiu had called him Ye Qiu – yes, he had been too lazy to write or say the other one's full account name. This habitat hadn't changed, even when he found out that Lord Grim and One Autumn Leaf were the same person. Even now he sometimes would call Ye Xiu Ye Qiu. When the other one had informed him that the real name was Ye Xiu, Muqiu had busted out into laughter and it became even louder when hearing that Ye Xiu had a twin brother called Ye Qiu. "Have you called your avatar after your brother?", Muqiu had asked once. "No, it was an accident", had been the answer.  
Muqiu had placed the bag with the food on his lap. Was it fine for them to eat here? Somehow Muqiu doubted that Xiu's boss would be happy about it. Thinking about it, he had never encountered his friend's boss. He knew that said boss was a woman, but nothing else – oh, and she was so done with Ye Xiu's personality, which was quite understandable. Ye Xiu's obsession with Glory was second to none! Not even Muqiu would not say he was equally obsessed, less even more. Yet, he really liked that part of his friend and since he shared the other one's love for Glory, he had no problem dealing with the other one's obsession. People that weren't into gaming or Glory, would probably have some issues with it – or people that could live without Glory.  
"You're finally back?"  
"Yeah. Honestly, I thought I wouldn't make it out there. But don't worry, I got you one of the figures."  
All costumers were dealt with for now, so Ye Xiu also sat down and immediately took the bag from Muqiu's lap to look inside in search for the figure.  
"Ah, that's great. You even got the right one without me saying anything. Now you only need to sign it. Well, Mucheng's Dancing Rain would have been better, but I guess, it's already sold out. Your sister is just too popular!"  
Indeed, Muqiu had tried to get Dancing Rain at first, but since she was sold out, he had taken the second best choice. Ye Xiu hadn't told him, if he needed a specific figure and until now had never shown any particular interest in team Excellent Era's avatars besides their strengths and weaknesses. So, when he asked for a figure Muqiu concluded – after a round of thinking in the waiting line – that it was for someone else.  
The fact that Ye Xiu pushed the figure into his hands, followed by a pen was prove for his theory.  
"Who is it for?", Muqiu asked while signing the stand of the figure.  
"For the boss. She's a big fan of yours and Mucheng. Well, it's unfortunate that Dancing Rain is so popular. She would have been the better choice."  
Ye Xiu sounded really sad.  
"Are trying to hit on your boss?"  
It was a joke, but his friend seemed to take the question quite serious, since Ye Xiu looked at him as if he had lost his mind.  
"No, but maybe she will increase my payment."  
As if!  
Muqiu didn't know what had happened, but he was sure that Ye Xiu had done something stupid and needed to calm his boss down. Giving her a figure of one of her favorite teams, a figure of one of her favorite avatars, a figure signed by one of her favorite players, was probably the best idea make up for whatever he might have done.  
"Maybe you should just apologize for whatever you've done."  
"I would, if I knew what I've done."  
Perhaps it was his obsession with Glory that trigged his boss' agro. Wouldn't be the first time!

"Let's eat for now or else the food gets cold and that would be a waste."  
Without waiting for any kind of response, Ye Xiu stated eating, while playing Glory and taking care of the incoming and leaving costumers – it was just a handful, but one had still to take care of them. Muqiu silently watched his friend playing and working.  
"Want me to teach you, how to register the costumers and how to settle the bills?", Ye Xiu suddenly asked after they finished the fast food.  
About two hours were left until the new server opened.  
"I am not here to do your work!", Muqiu reminded the other one.  
"Oh, don't be like that. You should be thankful that I am so generous to let you use a computer without charging for it and not revealing your identity."  
Both sides knew that Ye Xiu did not really care, whether Muqiu helped him or not. First of all there wasn't much to do anyway and secondly they were friends and friends helped each other when needed – like all the times, when Muqiu gave Ye Xiu some money, so the latter could buy his cigarettes.  
"Well, I guess, I have nothing better to do. So teach me, oh great master of the reception."  
And with that Muqiu learned how to register the incoming people for a computer and settle the bills for those, who wanted to leave. Not that there was much to do, since barely anyone was coming or leaving – one and a half hour until midnight. Maybe he should have used the time to write Mucheng a message and ask her to meet up with him and give him his account cards. At least than he could play a little bit, while waiting for the new serve to start. In his despair Muqiu finally decided to ask Xiu for one of his accounts.  
At the moment the other one was playing as One Autumn Leaf in the Heavenly Domain, thus Lord Grim was unused! It really was a shame that a person could only use one account at a time. Even with two computers a person only had two hands and both were needed to efficiently play with one avatar. In case Ye Xiu would ever joint the pro scene, which avatar would he choose? He could only use one avatar, could only be register with the Alliance with one avatar! One Autumn Leaf and Ye Xiu were together since the start and one could even say that One Autumn Leaf was Ye Xiu and Ye Xiu was One Autumn Leaf. However those of the tenth serve knew Lord Grim more than One Autumn Leaf, also going pro with an unspecialized was not only a challenge, but also something that had never happened before. People anticipated Lord Grim to make his way into the pro scene. For them it was just a question of time, when it would happen. Some assumed that the club simply hadn't made the right offer to the person behind the infamous unspecialized, while others assumed that Lord Grim's owner simply was not interested. A few argued that the club may have given up on the player, since it was over a year since the tenth sever had been lunched and nothing had changed. New talents had entered the stage, but none of them were Lord Grim. Although the clubs were interested in new players, in remarkable talents, they wouldn't run after them forever. Muqiu had suggested team Excellent Era to give up on Lord Grim, because he knew that his newly made friend had no interest in joining them and this had been the best decision. His friend's personality wouldn't have fit into the team, especially since Ye Xiu valued teamwork the most. Him being part of a team that seemingly didn't know what teamwork even was, was unthinkable! So wasting resources and time to chase after him was stupid and Excellent Dynasty had more important things to worry about – since they were falling behind the other guilds more and more. On the other hand, maybe Muqiu shouldn't have made this recommendation back then and let Lord Grim get more materials from the guild to upgrade his weapon.  
"Give me Lord Grim", Muqiu demanded.  
"Why?"  
"I want to play."  
"Well, I figured as much."

As someone with a deep understanding and great interest in the equipment editor, Muqiu looked at the Myriad Manifestation Umbrella first, after he logged into Lord Grim's account. Of course he could simply asked Ye Xiu, how this unique weapon had been made and how it worked, but he preferred to find it out by himself. Therefor he started to play around in a relatively abandoned area in the Heavenly Domain. Somehow it wasn't surprising at all that Lord Grim had logged out at such an isolated place. Not only was he seen as some kind of monster and obstacle in the tenth serve, the inhabitants of the Heavenly Domain were even more unpleased by his present. It was probably the best that no one besides Ye Xiu's close friends knew that One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim were handled by the same person. Strangely enough barely anyone had a problem with One Autumn Leaf, which was probably due to the fact that while being a Battle Mage, Ye Xiu wasn't as shameless as usual. When asked about it, the other one had replied that there was no need for One Autumn Leaf to go on material hunt anymore, since Lord Grim could do this on his own now. One Autumn Leaf was mostly used to get around without standing out too much. The majority of the players in the Heavenly Domain didn't know about this once well-known avatar. Those who remembered didn't care anymore, since now there were more outstanding avatars and players. Who knew if One Autumn Leaf could even compete with them? Just because he once had been considered the strongest, didn't mean he still was the strongest. Muqiu was sure that those who now looked down on One Autumn Leaf would soon regret it. Ye Xiu was preparing for something big and whatever it was, it involved both of his avatars!  
"Where are you?", Muqiu asked after playing around for half an hour.  
"Dungeon."  
"Which one?"  
As if there were only one dungeon in the entire domain! What was wrong with his friend tonight? Usually he didn't asked so many questions, but it was not unusual for him to give such useless answers. Still, the combination of both annoyed Muqiu.  
As kind as Xiu was, he gave Muqiu the needed information, so the latter could come over. He may not be able to run the dungeon with the rest of the group, but he could wait for them outside and then go to the next one with them. There was still an hour left until the new served would be opened. And even then he had more than enough time to register with his account. There were no rewards for being the first to enter the new server. Well, the chances that the name one wanted for the avatar was already taken, was higher when registering later, but Muqiu did not care much about the name. During his career in the pro scene and as professional helper of the guild Excellent Dynasty, he was used to play avatars with ridiculous names – or see ridiculous names.  
While waiting outside many other players crossed Muqiu's path and although the avatars all had a stoic face, he always had a feeling of uneasiness when looking at them. It was as if he could feel the disdained and hostile looks of the players behind the monitor on him. Lord Grim was popular, but not in the good way. Of course, there were also people that like him or else the guild Ye Xiu had established in the tenth server, wouldn't have gotten any members. The same applied for the Heavenly Domain. Although the guild with the name Happy, was quite small, thus was quite weak, the big guilds did not dare to act negligent towards them. It was known to everyone that One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim both belong to this guild – it had been One Autumn Leaf, who had opened the guild in the Heavenly Domain. Chen Yehui had broken a glass, when he had heard this. As guild leader of Excellent Dynasty, he knew who One Autumn Leaf was or had been and he knew that said player had left the guild. How dare he to make his own guild and try to rival against the well-established guilds? That person was just as shameless and despicable as Lord Grim!

"Hey, boss! Wow, you're able to play with two accounts at the same time? Amazing! Well, that explains your unsteady performance in the dungeon. You shouldn't do that!", a loud and cheerful voice greeted Muqiu's Lord Grim, which caused him to almost jump out of his chair, because he hadn't expected such a loud noise suddenly tormenting his poor ears.  
The system should have given him a warning: "Warning: A loud Steamed Bun Invasion is approaching. Be prepared to go deaf."


	3. Chapter 3

For their dungeon run they decided to split up. It was only one hour until the new server would be opened, so it was the best to go for a small dungeon. Together with Steamed Bun Invasion, Soft Mist and Concealed Light Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu went into a Level 55 dungeon. Since all their character were already at the max level, they wouldn't be able to set a record, however this wasn't their goal anyway. The others that weren't dungeoning right now had other things to do. Ye Xiu's boss also had an account in the Heavenly Domain, a Luncher called Chasing Haze. She had decided to log out and take a look around in her Internet Café – normally she wasn't someone, who stayed up all night, but she made an exception every year, when a new sever was opened. Su Mucheng wasn't online, Concealed Light and Little Cold Hands would leave soon. Both were still students and had to go to bed soon, so they neither fall asleep during their lessons nor worse miss them. The last remaining member of their small group was One Inch Ash. He decided to party with some random Happy members and also tackle a five man dungeon.  
When Chen Guo came down from the second floor, she had a satisfied smile on her lips. From the looks of it there were barely any empty seats. For her little group of players, she had prepared a small room on the second floor. Usually her employees used the computers downstairs, but nowadays they often used their private little room upstairs. Ye Xiu still worked his night shift, while Tang Rou had switched to the evening shift. Half a year ago Qiao Yifan, a former member of team Tiny Herb, had also joint them in the Internet Café as manager – although this was more a cover than anything. All three were more invested in playing Glory than in doing the work they were actually paid for – not that Chen Guo actually cared. Well, she should care, since at the moment she lacked employees. Because of that those currently employed had to work overtime, but there was nothing she could do. If no one applied for a job as manager here, she also couldn't hire someone. She could consider herself lucky, that Ye Xiu, Tang Rou and Qiao Yifan didn't care much about the amount of time they had to work, as long as they were allowed to play Glory they were fine. The other employees aren't as simple, but didn't complain either. Yet she knew that it couldn't get on like this forever. Sooner or later more and more employees would leave and the situation would only get worse, but for today she ignored this issue and enjoyed the liveliness around her.  
Since she had no specific goal, she went to the reception desk after wandering around for a bit. Her heart skipped a beat, when she saw a stranger on the server computer. On a first impulse she wanted to jump at the stranger and demand an answer, but she was able to hold herself back. After spending so much time with Ye Xiu, her self-control had gotten better by a bit. If not, it was quite questionable whether Ye Xiu would still be alive today. That guy was just too good in driving her nuts! Calmly she walked over and took a look at the computer screen. In the past she had often watched Ye Xiu playing as Lord Grim or One Autumn Leaf, so what she saw now seemed very familiar to her. The person in front of the computer, on the other hand, didn't look familiar at all. Said person was cover so much that one could barely see their face, yet it looked as if the clothes were not appropriated for the cold weather outside. Of course, as the owner of the Internet Café, Chen Guo had heard of a costumer, who seemed to be friends with Ye Xiu and who was always dressed up as if he was a thief. Until now she had never met that person, because she was already in bed, whenever said costumer was coming over. More than once she had tried to stay awake, but she either fell asleep before that person could come or said person didn't show up for whatever reason. So in the end she just gave up on meeting that mysterious costumer – as long as he paid for the computer and didn't cause any trouble, she couldn't care less about who he was, yet she was still interests no matter how much she tried to deny it.  
Both Su Muqiu and Ye Xiu had seen Chen Gou coming other, but none of them greeted her. Muqiu didn't because he wasn't sure, who she was and how to properly greet her – he didn't want to offend her. And Ye Xiu hadn't done so, because he was simply busy. If his boss wanted something from him, she would say so.

Only after leaving the dungeon, Ye Xiu took of his headphones and turned around to greet her: "What's the matter boss? You look unhappy, although we are almost booked out. Did something happen?"  
"What's the matter?", Chen Guo repeated the first question in disbelieve.  
What kind of question was that? Wasn't it obvious, what the matter was? There was a stranger sitting and playing at the server computer and he was playing with Lord Grim!  
"Why do you let someone, who is not even an employee, play at the server computer? Have you gone mad?", Chen Guo explained.  
She didn't want to be rude to the unknown man, but she also couldn't ignore the fact that he was a stranger to her.  
"Well, you see there a special circumstances that required it. I wouldn't do so, if there was a different solution. Oh, by the way, I have a little gift for you, boss."  
Without waiting for an answer or any kind of reaction Ye Xiu turned around once more and grabbed the toy figure Su Muqiu had signed a while ago.  
"Here. I know you would have preferred Dancing Rain, but she was already sold out. But this one has a signature at the bottom, so I think it isn't that bad, right?"  
At this moment Su Muqiu was really curious what Chen Guo's face looked like. Was she angry? Happy? Disappointed or sad? Well, she probably wanted to kill Ye Xiu right now. The way she hold the figure in her right hand and clenched her left hand, it was safe to assume she was ready to punch that idiot in front of her at any time. However, before anything could happen Chen Guo left. She was too angry to talk now.  
What kind of image did Ye Xiu have of her? Did she look like someone, who collected toy figures? She may be a huge fan of team Excellent Era, more specifically a huge fan of the Su siblings – especially Su Mucheng – but she was not that kind of fan that needed every piece of merchandise of their favorites. And she was way to mature for toy figures! On the other hand, Ye Xiu had not only remembered her favorite Excellent Era player and avatar, but also tried to get a toy figure of said avatar. But since Dancing Rain was sold out – which was absolutely not surprising at all – he bought her second favorite avatar and even got a signature for her!  
Speaking of signature, she hadn't looked at the figure until now. After Ye Xiu had pushed it into her hand she hold it there without paying too much attention. Now that she was in her small apartment on the second floor, she took a closer look and indeed there was a signature – some unreadable scribble – at the bottom. However, whether this really was Su Muqiu's signature or not, was another question. There weren't many merchandises with Muqiu and even less with his signature, so it was hard to compare it with something official. Chen Guo did not doubt that Ye Xiu was so lucky to actually bump into Muqiu on the street, since that guy's luck was just too extraordinary – she had witnessed his luck before.  
Slowly here anger faded away. He had meant well with his action, so being angry with him was not right. She should at least thank him for his actions. While her anger faded she also remembered that she actually wanted to know, who the stranger on the server computer had been. Although she trusted Ye Xiu – he might be a bit strange sometimes, but she knew that he was not a bad person and wouldn't do anything that harmed her or her business – she didn't trust strangers, especially not those that looked like they were on the run. With large steps Chen Guo went downstairs once more. When she had first come down, she only wanted to enjoy the liveliness of her Internet Café – midnight was coming closer and closer – now she wanted to get an answer to her question.  
It was the same every year, when a new server was opened in Glory. However, this year people seemed to be even more excited than ever, which was probably because of Ye Xiu's Lord Grim. They all hoped to witness something similar in the new server as well. Chen Guo doubted that another Lord Grim would appear. There was no need for that. Of course, Ye Xiu could go into the new serve and level up another unspecialized, but for what purpose. He already had One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim to take care of, there was no need and time for another avatar to level up and created equipment for. Thinking about it, Chen Guo realized that Ye Xiu hadn't said anything about the new server. A few days ago she had asked him, whether he would go onto the new server or not and his only response was a short "Let's see". She, one the other hand, would love to start in the new server, but she didn't want to be alone, so she would probably not get a new account.

Some of the costumers greeted her, when they passed her way. At the reception desk, Chen Guo saw that the stranger was talking to a costumer. They seemed to know each other. Ye Xiu on the other hand was getting up from his place and moved towards her.  
"Your back, boss? Is something wrong with the figure?", he asked nonchalant.  
"Who is that?", she asked in return and pointed at Muqiu.  
"A friend. He is the person behind "Soft Waves"."  
Soft Waves was the account Muqiu had used, when he had played with Ye Xiu and the others until now. Therefore, Chen Guo knew him. She had a good impression of him. Besides his amazing skills he also seemed to be a very nice person.  
"Still, he can play at one of the free computers", Chen Guo insisted.  
"He could, but this wouldn't be very convenient. If you don't trust us, than you can stay with us for tonight. By the way, the new server is opening soon, so I will bring those account cards to little Tang and Yifan. Do you want an account as well?"  
"Of course! What kind of question is that?"  
Anger rose up inside of her again. She had asked him about this matter a few days ago and now he acted, as if nothing had happened and everything was planned beforehand – maybe it was.  
"Well then, I'll be back soon. Let's hope that our guild prosper in the new server!"  
Without waiting for permission to leave his place, Ye Xiu went upstairs to bring Tang Rou and Qiao Yifan their new account cards. Chen Guo on the other hand decided to approach Soft Waves. Now that she knew, who he was, it was easier to start a conversation.  
As soon as the costumer left and Muqiu was alone again, she approached him with a smile. She sat down next to him on the open spot left by Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu hadn't logged out of Glory, so she could see whatever his avatar One Autumn Leaf looked at – Lord Grim. Concealed Light had logged out, since he had something to take care of, but would be back shortly. Steamed Bun Invasion was talking nonsense and Tang Rou's Soft Mist just stood behind Lord Grim. Nothing out of the ordinary.  
"Good evening, I am Chen Guo, the owner of this Internet Café. Nice to meet you."  
Muqiu hadn't put on his headphones, while messing around with the equipment editor, so he could hear Chen Guo without problem. He switched his attention from the game to her – differently than a certain someone, who had no manners.  
"Nice to meet you, too", Muqiu replied.  
From Ye Xiu, he knew that Chen Guo was a big fan of his and his sister, so it probably wasn't wise to tell her his name – it would be troublesome if she blurt his name out, now that so many Glory fans were around. On the other hand, would she even believe him? He had shown his face to the public before, but this had been at the beginning of the Alliance, when he had been young – he wasn't that old and he hadn't changed much, but it was obvious that he was now older than a few years ago.  
Chen Guo wasn't stupid, so she realized that Muqiu didn't introduced himself, thus she didn't asked for his real name. The other one had his reasons, right?  
"Ye Xiu said, you're Soft Waves. I am Chasing Haze. Are you coming to the new server as well?"  
"Um, yeah, I am Soft Waves and yes I am coming to the new server."  
With that the conversation ended. Normally Chen Guo always found a topic to talk about and had no problems with interacting with strangers. However, this time she had the feeling that a conversation wasn't welcomed. Muqiu seemed busy with Lord Grim and the Myriad Manifestation Umbrella. Moreover he hadn't given her his name. Luckily, Ye Xiu returned after a few minutes and took his seat. Chen Guo left the reception and went back upstairs. At first she had wanted to use one of the free computers downstairs, but decided against it, after seeing how packed everything was and it would probably be more fun to start in the new server with Tang Rou next to her – and Tang Rou was upstairs together with Yifan.

"And? Have you revealed yourself to her?"  
"No, I didn't dare to. What if she screamed my name out of surprise? I would be dead by now!"  
"She wouldn't have believed you."  
"Most likely, but I don't take that risk! I prefer to stay alive for a little bit longer."  
Only one minute until midnight.  
Muqiu logged out of Lord Grim and passed the account card to Ye Xiu, who was telling Steamed Bun Invasion to log out and enter the new server. Afterwards he also left the game and put his two accounts away. Little Cold Hands and Concealed Light would met with the rest of them in the new server and had a card prepared. Su Mucheng would probably not come, since she didn't knew about her friends' plan and it didn't matter anyway. She could join them later on, if she wanted and had time for it. Ye Xiu had informed Steamed Bun about his plans beforehand, so the other one could get an account card. Now they only had to hope that everything went well.  
Only ten seconds until midnight. One could feel the excitement of the people in the air. They had already begun to count down to zero. Muqiu had to admit that he also felt excited – not because of the new server, but because of how enthusiastic everyone was about it. It reminded him of the first few years of Glory, when he had been a normal player like everyone else. Things got quite different, when becoming a pro player.  
As soon as the clock hit midnight, the new server was opened without any delay. More and more avatars were loaded into the Beginner Village with every passing second. It was almost impossible to move around and without moving it was impossible to receive the beginner guest that everyone had to go through first. Before Muqiu and Ye Xiu had to deal with this, they had to decide a name for their avatars. Neither of them cared much about the name, but they also didn't want to put in some random words. Mucheng was so much better with this!  
"Say, do you have any ideas for a name? If so, please share them with me", Muqiu said.  
"You had four hours to think of a name", Ye Xiu answered.  
"You had four hours as well."  
"I was working."  
"You were playing Glory for most of the time", was what Muqiu wanted to say, but did not. There was no use to it. They both hadn't thought of a name and no discussion would suddenly change that. All Muqiu knew at the moment, was his future class. Like the first account he had created, he would go with a Sharpshooter.  
"What class will you play?", he suddenly asked Ye Xiu.  
The other one had once played as Battle Mage and then as Unspecialized, so what class would he chose now?  
"Don't know. Battle Mage?"  
How creative!  
Muqiu didn't feel disappointed about it. To the contrary, he somewhat felt happy about it. In the first server he had been a Sharpshooter, while Ye Xiu had played as Battle Mage. Now they could play as Sharpshooter and Battle Mage with each other once more. It felt nostalgic, but it also reminded him of the undeniable truth that he never had the chance to play with Ye Xiu on stage and show everyone the might of their teamwork – which further reminded him that his former team lacked teamwork and kicked him out. He let out a loud sigh, while typing down his new name.  
"Autumn Colors?"  
"Yeah. My first account's name was Autumn Tree and yours were One Autumn Leaf."  
"I see."  
After confirming his name choice, Muqiu's avatar was sent into one of the many beginner villages. Ye Xiu on the other hand still had to decide a name, but after seeing his friend's choice he slowly typed down a name as well. Yet he stared at it for a few seconds and deleted it again. It was nothing but a name, but he understood Muqiu's feelings at the moment and didn't want to make any half-hearted decision.  
"Alright, let's do the quests and get as many first kills and clears as possible. We need to make our guild well-known", Ye Xiu declared after finally confirming his name choice.  
One may think that he said it in a loud and enthusiastic way, but that guy was as calm as ever.

The most enthusiastic person about guild matters was Chen Guo. It had been her, who had suggested to create a guild in the first place and she had decided upon the name. Ye Xiu and the rest had just went with the flow. Now they also just went with the flow. Besides them, there were also the four veterans of the previous server. One of them even became the guild leader there, but since they were no official club, everyone was allowed to do whatever they wanted. So coming to the new server was fine – a good guild didn't need the leader to be online all the time. Managing two accounts was easy – from what Muqiu understood those four also had accounts in the Heavenly Domain, but more or less had abandoned them. The environment of the Heavenly Domain was not to their likely and their original server was also no fun for them anymore. Muqiu had to start over in the new server, since he had no other account – at least not an available one. Ye Xiu and the rest could stay in the Heavenly Domain – it was more fun for them there, since their opponents were much stronger, although even those strong opponents seemed like noobs compared to them.  
"Do you have a plan for the new server and the guild?", Muqiu asked, while lining up to receive the beginner quests.  
"Get as many first kills and clears as possible?"  
"No plan, I see."  
Well that wasn't all too surprising. Although Muqiu was a pro player and not a guild member, he still understood the thinking and operating of a guild – he often had helped out in Excellent Dynasty, the guild belonging to the club Excellent Era. A new server always meant a lot of new players that needed to be won over. By getting first kills and clears the guild could start to make a name for themselves and attract attention. Later they would show off their strength and might through dungeon records. New players often were blinded by such things and would join the guild that left the most impression on them. Guilds like Chen Guo's normally didn't care much about such things. Not that they were not interested, it was more that they had accepted that these things would be monopolized by the guild with a professional club behind them. Guild Happy had caused a huge ruckus when they started to break dungeon records and did not fear the big guilds. Until then no player guild had dared to stand up against the well-established guilds, because until then there never had been a player guild that was strong enough to do so. Due to Lord Grim's fame, the guild was different from the other normal player guilds. Normally the guild leader of such a guild held no real power – of course he could decide who was allowed to enter the guild and who was kicked out, but he had no power over the actions of the members. However, in guild Happy no one dared to disobey Lord Grim's words. To most of the guild members Lord Grim was already something like a god – he was even more so than the pro players that were given the title of god. Besides Lord Grim's statues inside the guild, guild Happy was also more organized than other guilds. They had a point and rewards system similar to the big guild. Therewith guild members could put equipment or materials into the guild's storage room and receive point therewith, with these points they were allowed to lend equipment from the storage room. Of course there wasn't anything too outstanding in the storage room, but thing could change anytime. For Ye Xiu this was also a good way to get materials for the Myriad Manifestation Umbrella, since some of the materials could be obtain by running dungeons and killing hidden bosses – every member could encounter a hidden boss, as long as they were in a group. Collecting the materials on his own was quite time consuming and bothersome. Having a guild to help out, was very pleasant. Furthermore, Lord Grim's fame was not limited to just one or two servers, because of the Heavenly Domain Challenge people of other servers knew about him as well – so if any of them were to come to the new server, chances were good that they might join his guild. Only completely new player wouldn't know about him, but those wouldn't know or have any deep impression of the big guilds as well.

A friend request popped up on Muqiu's screen. Without any hesitation he accepted. More requests followed.  
"Oh, seems we're in different villages", Ye Xiu said when peeking at Muqiu's screen.  
Both of them were waiting in line to receive their quests, so there wasn't much to do for them right now.  
"Seems so. Where are the others?"  
"Little Cold Hands and Concealed Lights are with me. Steamed Bun, Tang Rou and boss are together and Yifan should be somewhere around you. Maybe he is waiting in a different line."  
"What about Sleeping Moon and Seven Filed?"  
"Don't know."  
Due to the amount of players, there were several Beginner Villages. In which village one would be sent to was chosen randomly, so one couldn't be certain to be with their friends in the beginning.  
"Do you know, which class everyone will use?"  
"No, but I guess, they will use the same class as now. Um, well maybe little Tang will change to Blade Master."  
"Is there anything you know for sure?"  
"Yes, I know that I have gotten my first quest before you, so hurry up!"  
And with that both focused on the game again, although there wasn't much to focus on. The quests were simply too easy for them, but they were a must. Muqiu searched for Yifan's One Inch Ash – it was possible to have the same name in different servers. Luckily they were not only in the same village, but also were close to each other. There were no team quests, but it was still more fun to have a friend at one's side. That way they also could make sure that they were together and had the same progress.  
Muqiu really like Yifan and he hoped that the latter would have another chance in the pro scene. Honestly, people like Yifan were not uncommon. A team could only have a certain amount of player, so even if someone was good, it didn't automatically mean that one would also have the chance to show it. Yifan was unfortunate enough that someone like Gao Yingjie, who overshadowed any other talent, was at his side, but he also had received a class that were not fitting for his strengths.  
Under Ye Xiu's guidance Yifan had changed from Assassin to Ghostblade. Muqiu helped as much as he could as well. As pro player he had encountered many Ghostblades and saw different styles, so he could give some useful advices and suggestions. There was still a difference between seeing a match between players and being one of those players in a match. Yifan was happy to get so much help from those two. At the moment there was no way for him to get into a team, so he wanted to improve himself until he was strong enough to be able to get a spot. For now he hadn't thought about how he wanted to make people pay attention to him, but it also wasn't necessary for now, since he wasn't good enough yet. At least that was his opinion.

As soon as a character reached level five, they could enter the first dungeon. The dungeons in the beginner stages had no entry limit, consequently one could run those dungeons as often as one wanted. Of course, the materials and equipment dropped in those dungeons weren't very valuable, but better than nothing. More important was the question, who was the first team to clear the whole dungeon and killed the bosses inside – including the hidden ones. To encounter a hidden boss, one needed a lot of luck and a party of at least two players. Theoretically Muqiu and Yifan were skilled enough to solo the dungeon and now that they were together, they should also be able to take down any hidden boss that may come their way, but there was nothing wrong with adding three more players to their group. As long as those three were not completely stupid, they would help them to get done with the dungeon faster.  
At the same time, Lord Grim and his group of three were already inside the dungeon. Although up until level twenty the avatars did not have a set class, people often decided on their class beforehand and only paid attention to the skills and suited equipment for their future class. An Wenyi had decided to use a Cleric once again, while Luo Ji wanted to be a Summoner. Ye Xiu didn't stop them. It didn't matter anyway, since they were only here for fun – what matter more were the events in the Heavenly Domain, but thanks to guild Happy's alliance with smaller pro team guilds they wouldn't miss out on anything important. Switching accounts was easily done.  
"Have you encountered the hidden boss?", Muqiu asked bored, while searching for a suitable group.  
"No, but this only means that we can slaughter our way through the dungeon without any worries or delays. As long as nothing unexpected happens, we will the first to clear it. Tang Rou and the others are also slaughtering their way through the dungeon."  
"Sounds like they also haven't encountered the hidden boss. Well, then this means it is up to Yifan and me to get it!"  
"With your luck?", Ye Xiu mocked.  
Although he had entered the beginner Village before Ye Xiu, it had been the other one, who had received the quest first and consequently also finished them first. Steamed Bun and Tang Rou had even been faster, only Chen Guo had hold them back a little. His luck today wasn't the best, but maybe Yifan had enough luck for both of them.  
Without reacting towards Ye Xiu's words the two entered the dungeon. If they were only after the hidden boss, the two of them were more than enough, especially now that Muqiu wanted to prove his friend wrong.

Usually Muqiu wasn't an impulsive person. If he were, he wouldn't been where he was now – or where he had been before his team had kicked him out. But now things were a little bit different. He wasn't in an official match and needed to be calm. Right now he was in an Internet Café playing in the new server with his friends for fun. There was nothing wrong with impulsively entering a dungeon just to prove that one's luck wasn't bad, although this decision was totally stupid because no one could influence luck. However, in Muqiu's case it seemed as if the heavens had mercy with him – or his luck had hold back until now, so it could be bestowed upon him all at once.  
When a player was about to encounter a hidden boss he would receive a system notification. Such a notification just had popped up on Muqiu's screen.  
"Ha, well seems as if I'm the lucky one, who gets the hidden boss", Muqiu bragged.  
"Then hurry up and kill it or someone else will do so", Ye Xiu replied.  
First kills and clears were important to the guilds, because those achievements would be announced by the system in the world channel. Consequently, it would be seen by all the other players. However, the system did not announce, who encountered a hidden boss or any other boss first. What mattered was, who killed it first. As such, even when Yifan and Muqiu were so lucky to fight the hidden boss of the first dungeon, didn't mean they also were the first to encounter it. It was very likely that another dungeon team was fighting it right now.

In the end, the luck stayed with Muqiu and Yifan through the rest of the dungeon. Ye Xiu and his team were the first to get out of the dungeon, shortly followed by Tang Rou. Of course those two teams immediately entered the dungeon again. Besides materials and equipment the dungeon also rewarded the players with experience. The amount of experience gained in a dungeon was higher than the experience gained by slaying monsters in the wild – consequently, it was faster to level up with running dungeons than with killing monsters. The chances to get first kills and clear were higher, when one reached the next level faster.  
After finishing their dungeon run, Yifan and Muqiu decided to look for three more players. Ye Xiu may have told Muqiu to help building up their guild, but Muqiu, first and foremost, was here to have fun. Meeting new player normally was fun.


	4. Chapter 4

Please don't forget to leave a comment after reading. Thank you.

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The place around the dungeon was crowed. Players were searching for others to join their group at every corner. Muqiu was only interested in groups of three or less, therefore he ignored all invites that were from groups of four. If one asked him, what kind of criteria he had for his search besides the number of people in a group, he couldn't give an answer. His decision was solely based on his feelings.  
The two player he found in the end were both new to Glory. One was new to online games in general, while the other one was only new to the first person perspective. There was no fifth person, so the four entered the dungeon and tried their best. Although he had to give a lot of explanations and instruction, it wasn't as bad as he had thought it would be. Their progress was slow but steady. Both new players did their best to follow Muqiu's instructions. While the one called "Pretty Little Psycho" was faster in understanding his orders and always tried to immediately fix her mistakes, the other one had problems with understanding Muqiu's instructions. Some mistakes of those two could be fixed right away, other needed more time, since they were mistakes due to their inexperience. Pretty Little Psycho was very talkative and didn't hold back when she didn't understand or was curious about something – also she seemed to get along quite well with Yifan. The person behind "Walking Disaster" on the other hand had only said a greeting, which was so soft that Muqiu was even unsure whether it actually had been a greeting or just his imagination.  
After their third run through the dungeon, Muqiu decided to write Walking Disaster a message – she may be too shy to talk with them, but writing should be fine, right? Yifan had already completely taken over the responsibility to instruct Pretty Little Psycho.  
Ye Xiu and the rest already took a small break from all their dungeon runs – it was a bit boring to do the same thing over and over again. Also Ye Xiu was still on duty, so he had to take care of the costumers needs. By now Sleeping Moon and Seven Fields also had found their way to the dungeon and grouped together with Tang Rou's Soft Mist, Steamed Bun's Steamed Bun Invasion and Chen Guo's Chasing Haze.

"Oh, you find some new players?"  
"Yeah. They are a little bit clumsy, but willing to learn."  
"Hurry and level up, so we can group up at level twenty."  
The next dungeon after Green Forest was Spider Cave, which could be entered at level ten. For a player at this level it was better to run the Spider Cave dungeon instead of the Green Forest to level up faster. Both dungeons could be entered as many times as one wanted, there were no entry limits. Besides dungeons one also could do quests to level up, but this method would take longer and for someone, who was after first clears and kills, out of the question.  
"Why are you in such a haste? Tang Rou, Steamed Bun and your boss are leveling up fast, so you can take the dungeon down with them."  
"We don't need a healer."  
For short moment Muqiu turned his head in Ye Xiu's direction and stared at him blankly. He had heard of his friend's "No Cleric" policy in the previous server, but witnessing it himself first hand was still strange. In the pro scene everyone would take a healer with them into the team competition, so he was used to always have a Cleric at his side. Previously Ye Xiu had used an unspecialized, so even without a specified healer, there was someone with a low level healing skill, just in case. Now things were different, since Ye Xiu was playing as Battle Mage – at least he would do so after reaching level twenty. Battle Mages were no Clerics, thus they couldn't heal. A full DPS team was no problem in the low level dungeons, but what would they do later? Muqiu didn't dare to compare the experiences of the previous server with this one, due to Ye Xiu's class choice. An unspecialized had many advantages and opened many possibilities.  
"Alright, I will do my best", Muqiu said.  
He wasn't that far behind Ye Xiu and the others, only one level was between them. The same applied for Yifan.  
With that both sides focused back on the game and leveled up as fast as they could. Before Muqiu had always searched around a bit for a fifth player, but now that Ye Xiu hurrying him to level up he skipped this part and re-entered the dungeon with the other three as soon as they left it. At first it had surprised him that the two girls didn't complain or say anything about it, but thinking about it, it wasn't too strange. Walking Disaster was new to all of this, so she simply followed along, because she thought this was just how things were done. Pretty Little Psycho, on the other hand, new that it was better to run a dungeon to level up instead of lining up to kill monsters. Also she liked her new online friends. She was here to have fun and as long as running the dungeon was fun to her, she wouldn't say anything against it. As soon as thing would get boring, she could always leave the group.  
Without any suspense everyone reached level ten and went for the Spider Cave dungeon. Despite catching up with everyone else, Muqiu and Yifan still were the last to reach level ten, but this wasn't much of a problem. Ye Xiu's and Tang Rou's group were after the first kills and clears, especially Tang Rou, who saw this kind of activity as a competition against Ye Xiu. This competition was a bit unfair, since Ye Xiu had to stop leveling from time to time to do his job, while Tang Rou was upstairs without anyone disturbing her.

As the name indicated Spider Cave was a cave filled with spiders. Those little spider monsters could poison the player, which would do constantly damage to the character until the poison effect wore off or an antidote was used. Some spiders could only bite, while other could also shot webs. So there were close and long ranged monsters. Before entering the Spider Cave Muqiu and his little group took a break. He used that time to search for a fifth member, while Yifan got some water – the latter even asked Muqiu, if he wanted something to drink as well, although Muqiu could get himself something quite easily.  
Pretty Little Psycho and Walking Disaster were gone, only their avatar still stood around. In the beginning stages this wasn't a problem, since the system protected the players from being killed by other players. However, as soon as the players left the Beginner Village it was possible to kill other avatars, which would cause the killed character to lose experience and maybe drop its equipment. In the normal servers cities were safe places, were killing each other wasn't possible, contrary to that the Heavenly Domain did not possess fixed safe places. However, the Heavenly Domain was something far into the future at the moment.  
"Still searching for new players? Do you want to drag them into our guild? How ambitious", Ye Xiu commented in a bored tone.  
"The more the merrier."

The first to leave were An Wenyi's Little Cold Hands and Lou Ji's Concealed Light, which caused Ye Xiu to be on his own. For him it was no problem to solo the dungeon, but it would take longer. So he also took a look around to find a group to party with. On Tang Rou's group it was Chen Guo and her Chasing Haze that left first. She wasn't a night person and needed her sleep, also she was the owner of the Internet Café and had business to attend to the whole day, so she needed to be fit. Tang Rou had the evening shift, so she could sleep during the morning, while Yifan would have to endure through the morning shift. However, for them this was nothing. The first thing Muqiu understood about his new friends was the fact that all of them had too much persistence. He was sure that when it was time to switch shifts none of them would feel tired at all. It was a bit scary and also kind of nice. Of course Muqiu would see it as something great, when people were so dedicated towards Glory, but he also understood that for others such a behavior was abnormal and worrisome.  
With a soft smile Muqiu leant back in his chair and watched Ye Xiu staring at the monitor. From the looks of it, it seemed as if Ye Xiu was thinking about how the use his skill points. Muqiu surpassed the urge to offer his help – Ye Xiu didn't need it, but he didn't care about this since he only wanted to tease his friend.  
Now was also the first time that Muqiu had a better look at Ye Xiu's new avatar. It was a male avatr that resembled One Autumn Leaf, which wasn't surprising, since both of this avatars were just randomly generated by the system. Funnily, One Autumn Leaf's appearance was very close to Ye Xiu's.  
"Fallen Leaves?"  
After checking Ye Xiu's avatar's appearance, skills and equipment, Muqiu finally stop at the name. His heart tighten.  
"Hm? Yeah, Fallen Leaves. Is something wrong with that?"  
"No. It's just… Our names don't have anything in common anymore."  
"What?"  
Ye Xiu turned his head and looked at Muqiu in confusion.  
"I mean we once had both "autumn" in our names. But now I am Autumn Colors and you are Fallen Leaves. That is no connection between those names anymore", Muqiu explained.  
And Ye Xiu wasn't Ye Qiu anymore, while Muqiu still was Muqiu.  
"Eh?"  
Ye Xiu was totally at loss. He really had put a lot of effort into this name – well, at least more than with his other accounts. But for whatever reason Muqiu was dissatisfied. No connection between their names? There was a connection!  
"How can you say, there is no connection? I thought this through! See, your first account's name was Autumn Tree. During the autumn leaves fall down from the tree, right? So, Fallen Leaves totally fits your first server account's name. Furthermore, your current name is Autumn Colors. When people think of autumn colors they will think of different colors like red, yellow, brown and so on. So I couldn't chose just one color, since the autumn has more than one color. However, whenever people will think of those colors they will most likely connect them with the fallen leaves. And last but not least, as you know, One Autumn Leaf's name should have been One Falling Leaf in the first place. See, there is a connection between our names."  
He really had put a lot of thought into his name, although this account wouldn't be treated as well as his other two. His main focus was still on the Heavenly Domain and his two accounts One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim. There was no reason for him to waste time on another account. Leveling up would cost him a lot of time and effort, while he always had to look out to the events in the Heavenly Domain – every boss was important and couldn't be missed. Yet Muqiu was dissatisfied a lot and even after given an explanation still looked unhappy.  
"What a roundabout way of thinking."

There was nothing Ye Xiu could do. To change his name at this point he could only make another account, but he didn't have another account card at hand right now. Consequently, he had to live with his name choice and Muqiu's dissatisfaction.  
From the second Muqiu had stepped into the Internet Café, Ye Xiu knew that something bad had happened. However, since his friend didn't say anything, he also didn't ask. But now he really started to worry. It was not Muqiu's style to complain about something as trivial as a name. Actually, Muqiu had barely mentioned their shared past in the first server, when they had met again. When they talked about the past, it was mostly when they told stories of the first server. Steamed Bun seemed to enjoy these kind of stories a lot.

Since there was nothing Ye Xiu could do for now, he returned his attention to the game. Now that he was on his own, he could also look for a few more people. For him it was no problem to solo the dungeon, however, it would take more time. On the other hand, he could take all the drops for himself. Tang Rou's team were only lacking one person, so their speed wasn't affected as much as Ye Xiu's, who lost two members and was now on his own. Muqiu and Yifan were still in their group of four, but this could change any time, since both were looking for another member – they had caught up with the rest of the time, so they started idling around again. While moving Fallen Leaves through the crowd before the Spider Cave dungeon, Ye Xiu spotted a very familiar name.  
Blue River.  
Blue River was the name of the guild leader of the previous server and the one, who suffered greatly under Lord Grim's existence. From their interactions Ye Xiu saw Blue River as an honest person, maybe a bit naïve sometimes, but overall a very good person. Without any hesitation he walked over to Blue River. Whether this Blue River and the guild leader Blue River were the same person, was something to be found out. No one could reserve a name for themselves. If one wanted a name, one had to be fast! There couldn't be avatars with the same name in the same server, however there could be avatar with the same name in different servers.

Blue River had his avatar turn around, when he heard someone greeting him. At the moment he was in a four man party and waiting for their fifth member to come, so he assumed that the person, who greeted him, was said member. But when he looked at the name of the other one, he was surprised and confused. This was not the person, he was waiting for. Politely he greeted back and was about to tell the other one that their team was already full, yet before he could say the last part he was already interrupted with a question.  
"Little Blue is that really you? Why are you here? Shouldn't you be the guild leader in another server? Is your guild trying to get rid of you? Your party seem to lack a person, why not add me?"  
Throughout his interaction with Ye Xiu, Blue River's resistance towards trash talk and stupidity had increased by a lot, which was quite helpfully in dealing with the other guild leaders. Nowadays barely anyone or anything could make him go mad, however this was only reading others. When it came to Ye Xiu, Blue River lost it immediately.  
"What do you want?", Blue River asked with an annoyed tone.  
He was certain that the person in front of him was Lord Grim's player. Only that person could cause him to immediately feel annoyed and could cause him to have the urge to punch someone. Not even Poplar Beach had been able to make Blue River that mad.  
"Nothing. Just having fun. Right now I am searching for a party, so why don't we work together again like back in the old days? We haven't done anything together in a long time."  
After entering the Heavenly Domain with Lord Grim, Ye Xiu only had returned to the tenth server three times. Blue River on the other hand may have an account in the Heavenly Domain, but since he was the guild leader he mostly played in the normal server. Therefore, those two had almost not interaction anymore after Lord Grim left the normal server. A few times they had encountered each other in the Heavenly Domain when fighting for a wild boss, but those interaction were short and due to the situation they sometimes only saw each other without any real interaction. Honestly, Blue River didn't mind it at all. He had missed Ye Xiu and Lord Grim at absolutely no point in time. For him the horrible deeds of Lord Grim were already part of the past and only things to be told as some kind of horror story to scare little kids. Unfortunately, the past and made its way into the present and was about to get him. Was it really too much to ask for to not have to deal with Ye Xiu?  
"We're already full. By the way, what class will you play this time?"  
If Ye Xiu would play as Unspecialized again, the horrors of the previous server would only repeat themselves, right? Of course, now every guild was prepared and would not fall for the same tricks again, but in the end there was nothing they could do against Ye Xiu. They probably would have to pay him, so he would give them a chance to compete for the dungeon records. Or he started to sell dungeon guides. That person was truly terrifying.  
"Oh, I will be a Battle Mage later. From the looks of it, you will be a Blade Master again."  
"Yeah. I have to go now."  
The fifth member of Blue River's dungeon party had arrived. Ye Xiu causally greeted the other one and then watched as the group left for the dungeon. All five knew him and he knew them. In the previous server they had set a dungeon record together. Now they would fight against each other for the records, although it was quite obvious, who would win.

Alone again Ye Xiu decided to also go into the dungeon. As soon as the finished there should be more players outside, since another bunch of player would have reached level ten, right? In the meantime, Muqiu had found another member for his party. It was future Blade Master. Differently than for example Walking Disaster that player had mainly put their skill points into Swordsmen skills. Here and there also were a few skills from other classes, but it was clear what path this player wanted to take in the future. Walking Disaster had many skills form different classes, however it seemed that she was more interested in magical skills. Pretty Little Psycho was a mix between those two. She seemed to have a vague idea where she wanted to go to, however her end goal wasn't set yet. It was a good thing that one hadn't had to decide for a class right from the start, but could wait until level twenty. This way new players could figure out which class suited them the most or which one they enjoyed the most – both things were not necessarily the same. When reaching level twenty a person could change their character's class – no one had to, but this was what most people did. The skill points would be reset, so one could allocate them once again. This way no one had to fear trying out different class skills, since they would get all their used skill points back at level twenty.


	5. Chapter 5

Please be so kind and leave a comment after reading. Thank you.

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Tang Rou will change classes from Battle Mage to Blade Master, so in case you want me to change her avatar's name, just say it.  
I hope that the other names (Autumn Colors, Fallen Leaves and the two OCs) are fine with you. I am really bad with names - I wasn't even able to give my hamster a fucking name... (In the end his name was simply "hamster" until he died.)

Also I am sorry that I always takes me so long to get to the point. We already have five chapters, but only now Muqiu's retirement was announced. And no, I won't describe much of the in-game fights etc. because I suck at such things. Yet I hope that you can still enjoy this story.

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Around seven Yifan came down to help Ye Xiu settling the bills and took over the reception. Muqiu used that time to go to the restroom and take a breath. Sitting around for so long made him feel a bit stiff. Outside his gaze fell upon Excellent Era's sign. It was as bright as ever. A huge contrast to the team's current performance. However, now with a new captain and ace player the future might be bright again, right? After letting out a sigh Muqiu went back inside. Yifan was sitting at the reception. Ye Xiu was in the smoking area of the Internet Café. After getting his account card, Muqiu also went into the smoking area, although he did not smoke.  
"You're not tired?", Muqiu asked when sitting down in the chair next to Ye Xiu.  
"I am, but not tired enough to go to bed now. What about you?"  
"Same."  
Just like Ye Xiu he was tired, but not tired enough to go to bed at the moment, so he would stay up a little bit longer.  
At this point it was obvious to everyone that something had happened to Muqiu, because normally he wouldn't have the time to play with them throughout the night. Shouldn't he head back to his team and start his daily training? Why was he still here, wasting his time in the new server? There was only one logical conclusion to this matter, therefore no one asked Muqiu what was going on. Why asking the obvious? If there was anything to say, he would say it when he felt it was time to say it.

After two or three more hours both Ye Xiu and Muqiu went to bed. Ye Xiu still slept in his storage room that he had occupied ever since he started working at the Internet Café. Back then Chen Guo hadn't searched for new employees, however she also didn't have the heart to send Ye Xiu away, when he asked her for a job. Since there were no free rooms in the employee's apartment, Ye Xiu got the storage room in Chen Guo's apartment on the second floor. Tang Rou also lived there. The three were so used to this arrangement that even now that there were free rooms in the employee's apartment Ye Xiu still slept in the storage room.  
"You can sleep there", Ye Xiu said pointing at the bed in the small room.  
"What about you?"  
"I will sleep on the sofa."  
Without any further remarks Muqiu went to bed, while Ye Xiu decided to settle a few things first before occupying the sofa for the next few hours.  
Chen Guo was awake by now and busy with work, however she was never too busy to not have time for her employees, even when said employee was Ye Xiu – the man that could drive her nuts with just his smile. How many times had she wanted to smash his head against the wall? How many times had she wished someone would beat him up in Glory, just to get him down from his throne? How many times had she wondered, why she even bothered with him? Too many times. However, no matter how annoying he could be, he also had his good sides and Chen Guo would consider them friends. His disinterest in anything not Glory related annoyed her a lot, but it also had its good sides. Ye Xiu never complaint about his room or about food or his work – he would probably start complaining, if she put him into the morning or evening shift. So when he suddenly stood in her office and wanted to talk with her, she was startled. Something like this had never happened before. Had something happened? If he were someone else, she might be able to think about a reason for this behavior, but despite her considering each other as friends, she barely knew anything about Ye Xiu. He never talked about his family, his past or any other thing related to himself. Chen Guo also didn't ask any further.  
"What's wrong?", she asked concerned.  
"Nothing. I just want to talk to you about my friend."  
Chen Guo was a very soft and kind hearted person, although she didn't know the person at the server computer, she had accepted it, because that person was Ye Xiu's friend and she trusted Ye Xiu. She was even so nice to accept that Ye Xiu had brought Muqiu into her apartment – which was the reason why he wanted to talk to her, since he felt it was better to inform her and ask her for belated permission – without knowing the other one's name or circumstances. Maybe she would be less accepting if Muqiu weren't Ye Xiu's friend or if she and Muqiu wouldn't know each other through Glory – she may only know is in-game ID, but this was enough for her.

The rest of the day went by very quickly. Yifan left his account card behind, when he got off his shift and went to the employee's apartment. Tang Rou barely had time to play Glory during her shift, however she used that time to read guides on her new class – this time she wanted to play as Blade Master. Also she watched some matches of Huang Shaotian, who was considered to be the best Blade Master in the Alliance at the moment. Bao Rongxing had went to bed as well after being reminded by Ye Xiu. Truth be told, Ye Xiu was only worried that Steamed Bun leveled up too fast and couldn't go into the dungeons with them later, since his level was too high. Seven Filed and Sleeping Moon were both adults that could take care of themselves, therefore they didn't need to be reminded to go to bed. Now in the late afternoon, early evening everyone was sleeping, expect for Tang Rou and Chen Guo, who both had to work – and maybe Luo Ji and An Wenyi, who were busy with school. However, three of them already had slept, so they weren't tired, and the fourth would go to bed soon.  
This day could have been like every other day at which a new Glory server was opened. Yet this wasn't the universe's plan. When Muqiu got up he immediately went downstairs after visiting the bathroom. On his way down he warped his scarf around himself, while trying not to look like some thief. A rumble could be heard. He was hungry. After eating dinner with Ye Xiu yesterday, he hadn't eating anything, therefore it was only logical that he was hungry again. Luckily there were enough restaurants around, so he could pick whatever he wanted for his extremely belated breakfast. Unfortunately, his thoughts of what to eat were interrupted, when he finally realized that it was a little bit too dark inside the Internet Café. A blackout? Apparently not, since there was some faint light from a projector. From Ye Xiu he had heard that this Internet Café broadcasted Excellent Era's matches, but since Muqiu was part of Excellent Era he hadn't been able to witness the broadcast himself. Matches were always on Saturday at 8 p.m. Today wasn't Saturday. So what was this broadcasted about? This question was answered as soon as Muqiu reached the reception desk and heard a male voice commented on the pictures that were currently shown to the people. Muqiu turned his head towards the projection. A very familiar face looked back at him. Only a few hours ago this face had looked at him with a triumphing smile on its lips. He had seen that face so many times before. It was the face of a former friend – at least he had thought they were friends. This broadcast was about his retirement, not about a match. Muqiu didn't listen, but left after confirming the topic of the broadcast. There was nothing for him to listen to. He already knew that his time at Excellent Era, in the Alliance, was over. Not that he was fine with that, but he also couldn't change it. One year without playing Glory professional was a long time, especially when one wasn't considered young anymore – Muqiu was still young, but not in Glory terms.

Muqiu left the Internet Café to get breakfast. Before he had thought about what to eat, now he just entered the first restaurant that had opened and looked like it wasn't too expensive. He searched for a place, where he could easily hide from the eyes of the other guests, and sat down to order. Back when he signed his contract with Excellent Era he had thought that he would stay with this team until he retired on his own and afterwards helped them in the research and development department. Never had he thought that his team forced him out and that he had to leave the Alliance. He was sad. It felt strange to not know what might happen next or what to do. Muqiu wasn't done with Glory. Maybe he wasn't the youngest player anymore, but he wasn't old enough to leave. He still could fight! However, he had no team.  
Now that he was retired he had some time to reflect on the past. To be honest, it wasn't all too surprising that Excellent Era had kicked him out. They wanted money, he only wanted the championship. Until now Muqiu had barely partaken in any interviews or advisement. The few he had done, were all done in the first few years of the alliance. Later he refused simply because he had no time for such things. His focus was on the championship and supporting his team. He couldn't understand the hype about him and he didn't like it at all. All he wanted was to play Glory and win. Nothing more, nothing less. However, from a business point just winning was not enough, especially since no one could guarantee the victory of a team.  
In the end because of the lack of communication between the team's wishes and demands and Muqiu's wishes and demands, things turned out this way. Muqiu felt sad, betrayed, lost and angry. Angry at himself for not trying to communicate with Excellent Era better. He didn't blame his former team, but he was disappointed at how they had handled the matter. At the moment the team was instable. There was no teamwork and no one to take the lead. Their new captain was not only just a rookie in the Alliance, he also was new to the responsibilities of a captain and new to the team. It would have been better, if they had given him the chance to become a part of the team and slowly take over the role of the new captain. Yet it seemed to be more important to force Muqiu out than to stabilize the team. Very sad. Deep inside Muqiu hoped the best for his former team. He had seen it rise and fall – he didn't want to see it disappearing.  
Muqiu took his time with eating. He wasn't in a hurry at all. No training or match preparations were waiting for him. Such a thing usually only happened after match days – Sundays were free days for the pro players – or during the summer break. Now he had one year full of such days. He already missed the monotone training. It had been a part of his live for so long, thus it felt strange to know that this part was now gone all of a sudden. A lot of things were gone now. For example he also had no place to stay at the moment. After joining team Excellent Era he and Mucheng lived inside the club building, so now that he left, he also had no place to stay any longer, hence he had to search for an apartment or something similar. Maybe he could stay at the Internet Café for a few days until he found something? As soon as he would return, he would go and ask Ye Xiu's boss. From what his friend had told him and what he had heard about her form the other group members Chen Guo sounded like a nice person, who would help someone in need – and Muqiu was someone in need right now.

The first person to welcome him back at the Internet Café was Ye Xiu, who stood outside and smoked. Ye Xiu's gaze had been fixed on the club sign of Excellent Era right across the street until he saw someone familiar approaching from the corner of his eyes. The majority of the costumers had left after hearing the announcement of Muqiu's retirement. Due to the Internet Café's location many costumers were fans of team Excellent Era and not few were fans of Muqiu. So there mood was brought down to zero, when they heard that their captain – former captain – had left the team. Some had even started to cry, while others were angry that Muqiu for leaving the team during such a hard time. Shouldn't the captain stay with the team until the bitter end?  
Chen Guo had been one of those, who started crying and run out of the Internet Café. However she soon went inside again, since it was extremely cold outside and she wanted to suffer in peace and not with that irritating smoking demon disguised as human called Ye Xiu. That guy looked as clam and untouched as ever. She couldn't understand him at all. It was obvious to everyone who had at least once interacted with Ye Xiu that this guy loved Glory a lot and he paid so much attention to the different matches – ever since he entered the Internet Café Chen Guo listened more to his comments on matches than to those made by the commenters at the broadcast. How could someone like that feel nothing by such an announcement? Hadn't he often praised Muqiu's skills? Even when he wasn't a fan of a specific team, he was a fan of Muqiu, right?  
"And, any plans for the future?", Ye Xiu greeted Muqiu as soon as the latter was standing next to him.  
Muqiu looked towards Excellent Era.  
"I need a living place. Any suggestions were I can find something nice?"  
"Forest Park?"  
"Something nice and far away from my former colleagues?"  
"I know a nice place, but unfortunately this place is even closer to your former team than Forest Park."  
Under Muqiu's skeptical gaze Ye Xiu pointed at a posting.  
"We're currently hiring. Accommodation and food will be provided. Sounds great, right?"  
The Happy Internet Café was indeed closer to Excellent Era than Forest Park. On the other hand, working here would solve two problems at once. First he would have a place to stay and secondly he had a job. Also an Internet Café was the perfect working place for someone like him, who loved playing Glory all day long. The only downside, besides the closeness to Excellent Era, was the fact that despite him barely showing up in public he still was a public figure and if someone in the Internet Café recognized him it could turn into something really ugly. It was a risky job.  
"You've planned this?"  
"Yeah, I planned that your team kicks you out, while we are short on people. I planned that your team kicks you out on the day the new server opens and planned to drag you with me. Then I planned that you would wake up just to see the announcement of your retirement and I planned this whole conversation. I've came up with this plan many years ago and ever since then prepare for it to be set into motion. Don't you think you give me too much credit?"  
"With you, one never knows."  
"You're overthinking this."  
"I have the feeling I am underthinking this."  
With that said Muqiu walked past Ye Xiu and entered the Internet Café again. Although it had sounded like he wasn't interested in the offer, it was the only option he had right now – at least if he didn't want to waste his time with searching. However, just the second he entered the Internet Café he walked out of it again, looking at Ye Xiu very serious.  
"I don't know what you are planning, but I know you are planning something."

Chen Guo had retreated into her living room, watching some old videos of Muqiu and team Excellent Era. Whether this was a good idea was questionable, but her heart wasn't ready to let go of the former captain of her favorite team. So she tried to fill that hole that was ripped into her heart with some nostalgia. All she could do was hope that this was just a nightmare or some bad joke – she was aware that it was neither a nightmare nor a bad joke, but a fan was allowed to dream, right?  
She was startled when Muqiu suddenly stood in the living room. Chen Guo hadn't expected anyone to come here at this time. Tang Rou was busy with work and Ye Xiu usually would spent his time with playing Glory. Yifan was in bed. Therefore it was the perfect time to suffer alone and being miserable. Now her alone time was cut short. Upon seeing Muqiu she grabbed some tissues to get rid of her tears and look more presentable. The videos stopped playing.  
"What can I do for you?"  
"Err, well… Ye Xiu said you're currently searching for employees."  
In this situation it was not strange for Chen Guo to be embarrassed, yet Muqiu also somewhat felt embarrassed. He had seen a part of the videos and he had seen Chen Guo crying like a child. Wasn't she a grown up women? Why was she acting like this? Why was she crying like this because of his retirement? They didn't even know each other. Well, Muqiu knew her to some extent, while Chen Guo had no clue who he really was. Actually, she was the only one, who didn't know.  
When Muqiu had started playing with Ye Xiu and the others, they had mostly played in the normal server. Chen Guo only had her Chasing Haze in the Heavenly Domain. Her normal server avatar was still in the beginner village, since she wasn't really interested in the normal server. Also for some it was hard to give up on her first accounts. Entering the Heavenly Domain was hard work and something to be proud of.  
Later, when everyone was finally in the Heavenly Domain it was already a known fact that he was Su Muqiu, a pro player and captain of team Excellent Era. Therefore no one thought about telling Chen Guo. She was a part of the group since the beginning, even when she wasn't playing with them, she often watched them or helped them out with finding guides. Consequently, everyone assumed she knew about Muqiu as well. The same applied for Su Mucheng, who was Chen Guo's favorite player and the reason why she played as Luncher.  
Tang Rou had found out about Chen Guo's unknowingness at some point, but also did nothing against it. She wasn't someone that talked about other people behind their backs. Maybe Muqiu didn't want to reveal himself to Chen Guo or he also simply had forgotten about it. Nevertheless this was his matter, since it was his identity, so she kept silence and only informed the rest of the group that Chen Guo was in the dark about Muqiu and Mucheng. Moreover, even if Tang Rou had said something, would Chen Guo have believed her? Probably not. Over the years more than once someone had claimed to be a pro player and tried to gain attention, fame or some other totally trivial and useless shit.

"Yes, I am hiring at the moment. You have read about the conditions, right?"  
"Yeah."  
"Well then, I am Chen Guo. Your boss from now on, but you can call me Sister Chen. That's was everyone is calling me here."  
Chen Guo stood up from the sofa and made her way towards Muqiu to greet him properly.  
"Su Muqiu", Muqiu introduced himself.  
Midway Chen Guo stopped and starred at her new employee, who just revealed to be her retired idol. Although she was easy to trick and believed people way too fast, she wouldn't believe such a thing. Of course this could be a coincidence. This world was big and was inhabit by many people, why should there be only one Su Muqiu?

In the meantime Ye Xiu had finished his cigarette and went upstairs to see if Muqiu and his boss were both still alive. What he saw, however, confused him. Muqiu was standing in the doorway, while Chen Guo stood in the middle of the room looking as if she had seen a ghost.  
"What's wrong?", Ye Xiu asked.  
"I don't know. I introduced myself and ever since then she looks like this. Did I break her?"  
Despite his lack of participation in various events, Muqiu was no stranger to fan interaction. It wasn't normal for them to be so silent. Normally they were loud and wild, when they were near their idol, but Chen Guo just stood there doing nothing and this was extremely worrying and scary.  
"She probably doesn't believe you. Now she wonders, how she can handle such a shameless person like you."  
"You shouldn't judge others by your own standards."  
"I'm not judging you, but she is."  
Before the conversation between those two could go any further, Chen Guo awoke from her stare and decided to not say anything about it. This person was a friend of Ye Xiu and Ye Xiu was a strange fellow, so of course his friends would be strange as well. If that person wanted to be Su Muqiu then so be it. She couldn't force the other one to say what he didn't want to say. Who knew what this person's background was.  
"Well, how about I show you your new room, Muqiu? The employees' apartment isn't far from here. Yifan lives there as well."  
From the tone of her voice it was obvious that she didn't believe Muqiu about his name.  
"You don't have to force yourself to call me Muqiu, just Qiu or so is fine. I'm not picky. And about the accommodation…"  
"Let him sleep in the storage room", Ye Xiu interrupted.  
Two annoyed people looked at Ye Xiu. The storage room was barely enough for one person – Chen Guo couldn't understand how Ye Xiu could sleep inside that small place. It was fine for a few days, but that guy lived in it for more than a year! Had he no standards?  
"There is only one bed inside."  
"That's no problem. We don't need another person for the night shift. So give him the morning or evening shift. While he sleeps at night, I will work, and when I go to bed he will work. We won't be in each other's way. You see, boss, for Muqiu it is not quite convenient to run around outside and when he has to go through the streets every time he has to work or to bed it is very likely that someone recognizes him and then what? His fans will follow him to his apartment or work. And then it won't be only problematic for him."  
Chen Guo was at loss for words. Fine, if this guy wanted to play along then so be it. If her current self would be the same as her past self, she might start to argue with Ye Xiu, but she knew better than this. If those two wanted to share a small storage room together, let them! As long as they did nothing illegal or unappropriated she shouldn't care.  
"Do whatever you want, just don't do anything illegal or stupid."  
With that Chen Guo left the living room and went back downstairs to check on her costumers – she mostly just wanted to get away from Ye Xiu and his friend. What catastrophe has she brought upon herself again? As if Ye Xiu wasn't enough already.  
"So, those that mean I'm hired?"  
"Yes, you're hired. You can start tomorrow in the morning shift with Yifan. I am sure he will be happy to be instructed by you personally."

Now that he had a place to stay and a job, Muqiu again had no further plans.  
"Do you plan on returning to the pro scene?", Ye Xiu suddenly asked, while he led Muqiu towards the smoking area.  
No matter what, they had to level up and establish their guild or else their boss would be angry. Chen Guo was still hyped about having a guild in Glory. She even had left her previous guild Excellent Dynasty, which belong to the club Excellent Era. For a fan like her this was something noteworthy. The reason she had joint Excellent Dynasty was to support her favorite team and her favorite players Su Mucheng and Su Muqiu. By siding with Ye Xiu, she actually did the exact opposite of what she wanted to do, when she first joint Excellent Dynasty. Guild Happy was no threat to the club guilds, but Ye Xiu was a big threat! Especially when he allied with four smaller club guilds. The competition for wild boss materials got fiercer. Clubs needed those material to craft their self-made equipment. Without those materials the equipment could neither be repaired, nor recreated or improved. Therefore by creating a guild and competing against the club guild, guild Happy hurt the pro players. Yet Chen Guo didn't seem to mind this at all or she simply hadn't thought about this, which couldn't really be hold against her. Guilds always competed against each other over wild bosses. No one could say, which guild got the boss. Sometimes it would be this guild, next time it would be the other one. Smaller clubs had smaller guild and those couldn't really fight with the big guilds over a boss, yet those clubs still were able to snatch bosses and created silver equipment. Why? Simply because the Heavenly Domain was just too big and no guild could cover every part of the Heavenly Domain. Those smaller guilds tried their best to get those unnoticed bosses. Happy was in an even worse position than those small club guilds. No matter how skilled Ye Xiu was, with just a handful of people he couldn't win against an army, let alone against an army from every guild. The alliance between the five guilds was the only way, how Happy would be able to get high level bosses and materials. Besides them not having enough people to fight against the other guilds, Happy also lacked an information network. How could they be able to find any bosses, when no one searched for them or in case they run into them report it to Ye Xiu? The information on wild bosses were mainly from the other four guilds.  
Muqiu shrugged his shoulders in response to Ye Xiu's question. He honestly didn't know. Did he want to return to the pro scene? Yes, he did! He wanted to win another championship. At least one more! He wanted to play at least once more against other outstanding players and see who had the better tactic, who was stronger. Moreover, he didn't want to disappear so silently and ungracefully. When he started something, he also wanted to bring it to an end, even when this end was not a nice one. However, due to his clubs decision he couldn't bring this season to an end. He had to stop midway. This felt worse than any loss he had to endure over the past years.  
"Well, if you're not planning on going back, then you most have a lot of free time at hand. Our little guild needs someone like you."  
Muqiu knew that Ye Xiu wasn't too deep into the whole guild matter. He went along with his boss' wish, because why not. Ye Xiu wasn't interested in any of the big guild and he didn't want to bond himself to the responsibilities that came with being part of a guild – and if he had entered a normal player guild with his Lord Grim, this small guild would surely have to endure at lot of bulling from the club guilds. When it came to guilds, Ye Xiu only cared about the extra stat points given by the guild's guardian.  
"Why are you so enthusiastic about this whole guild building?"  
"Because we need the guild to take revenge."  
"Revenge?"  
"Revenge against Excellent Era and the only way for us to do so is by taking down Excellent Dynasty, thus we need a guild."  
A short moment of silence followed. Muqiu was sure Ye Xiu was just joking, but he still couldn't believe what he just had heard.  
"I know it, you had this all planned out!"  
"Huh, wasn't that what I have said before? I planned it all. You being kicked out and coming her and so on. I am amazing, am I not?"  
"You're annoying as hell!"


	6. Chapter 6

Well, and this is why I shouldn't write long fics. It takes me forever to update, nothing much happens, the chapters are boring and maybe I should just simply give up on writing as a whole... because I suck...

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* * *

Revenge? This was something Muqiu was not interested in. First of all, he had no reason to take revenge. Yes, the way thing had been handled by his former club were far from nice and they were probably even morally questionable, but it was understandable. Furthermore, he also was partly at fault for how things turned out. Secondly, taking down a guild needed a lot of time and resources. Muqiu neither had a lot of time nor any resources. A club and its guild were closely connected with each other. If the club did bad, so often did the guild. However, Excellent Era had suffered a lot the past few years, yet Excellent Dynasty was still a formidable enemy towards the three great guild, Blue Brook Guild, Tyrannical Ambitions and Herb Garden. If Excellent Dynasty was able to hold on against those three guild, how should Muqiu without a guild or a small guild like Happy do anything against Excellent Dynasty? It would take years for Happy to become as strong as one of the club guild and even longer to seriously cause damage to Excellent Dynasty – and this only when Excellent Dynasty did not get stronger and improved. Excellent Era had replaced him with another player – someone who was better than him in their eyes. Partly Muqiu hoped that they would improve again and fight their way back to the peak of Glory. If Excellent Era returned to their former strength, than it was very likely that Excellent Dynasty also grow stronger. There was no way for Muqiu to do anything against Excellent Dynasty besides being an annoying housefly. Taking revenge on Excellent Era directly was even more of a fantasy – for that Muqiu would need a team and then fight against his former team and win. But even then the harm would be minimal, since losing once or twice would not destroy a club.  
Yet, Ye Xiu's little joke made Muqiu thinking. People took revenge when they had been wronged, when something had happened they couldn't accept, because it involved underhanded methods or because they thought the other side had used underhanded methods. Muqiu couldn't accept his departure from the professional scene. He may not be the youngest anymore, but he also wasn't old enough to leave. Moreover, Excellent Era had used questionable methods to get rid of him. The performance of the team dropped every year to the point that now they had to fear to be relegated. It wasn't Muqiu's fault alone. Glory wasn't a single player game. He had teammates, but those teammates didn't work with him. They ignored his order, looked down on him, ignored his advice and therewith committed the same mistakes over and over again. The team was completely out of sync. Only Mucheng worked together with him. But two people working together was not enough to win against a whole team. Neither the management nor the executive did anything against it. They turned a blind eye towards the other players and only focused on Muqiu. As the captain he had to take the blame! Over the years even the fans started to criticize him more and more and pushed the blame on to him. Who could blame them? He being the problem was even supported by the club and the fans were not good enough or didn't want to see, how the team worked against him. Not even a new captain could change such a dysfunctional team – at least not someone like this brat! If it were someone like Wang Jiexi, the current captain of team Tiny Herb, or Yu Wenzhou, the third captain of team Blue Rain and one of the four master tacticians, than there was hope, because they had experience in leading and knew the importance of teamwork. But that replacement of his was just a brat – even Zhou Zekai, who barely spoke a word, was a better captain than that brat. The sad truth.

Muqiu sighed and logged into the game. Building up their guild was now his new priority. Honestly it somewhat made him feel excited, because it reminded him of the time, when Excellent Dynasty had been created. Ye Xiu and Muqiu were one of the first members of the guild and had helped to build it up. The fame of One Autumn Leaf had led many players to Excellent Dynasty and with their teamwork Muqiu and Ye Xiu were able to get many dungeon records and wild bosses – of course it wasn't just them, but their strength was one of the main factors. Besides fighting power they also had great leading skills and tactical understanding. If Ye Xiu were part of the professional alliance than he would be one of the master tacticians for sure.  
Another sighed followed this thought. Why was Ye Xiu still not a part of the alliance? On the other hand, if he were then there was a good chance that Tang Rou would have never started playing Glory and consequently the alliance would miss out a great talent – let's ignore the fact that Tang Rou had already refused several invitations from official clubs. Steamed Bun probably would also never be found – only thanks to Ye Xiu's guiding did Steamed Bun slowly show his true talent. And Yifan? Who knew what he would have done – well, Muqiu also didn't knew that Yifan's current plans were. Did the boy want to stay here in the internet café and play with Ye Xiu or did he want to get back into the professional scene? In case of the latter, how did he intend to do that? Gain attention inside the game and hope someone would pick him up?  
Well, all of this had nothing to do with Muqiu. What had something to do with him, however, was the fact that his avatar had reached level twenty and was currently standing outside of Frost Forest – the first leveling area and dungeon outside of the beginner stage. Differently than the dungeons before, Frost Forest had an entry limit – it could only be run a certain amount of time a day. Therefore the leveling speed would decrease a lot. Besides dungeons, one could also do quests or kill monsters to level up. Quests were the second fastest way to gain experience after dungeons, while killing monsters was the slowest way.  
With great difficulty Muqiu tried to remember when he had reach level twenty and went to the Frost Forest. However, he could not find such memories, which wasn't surprising. When he had went to bed, he actually had forgotten his account card – a bad habit of his – and Yifan had taken it to level it up together with One Inch Ash. After reaching level twenty guild Happy had been created and with some other guild members Yifan had taken down Frost Forest. The first clear for Frost Forest belong to Happy! And soon they would rule over the leaderboard as well.

Muqiu checked his avatar's inventory and found quite a bit of items, since he didn't need them at the moment the decided to store them away. At the same time he also discover that he had the title of guild leader. Every other person might be happy about such a position, but Muqiu wasn't every other person – for him this position was more of burden. The second in command was Chen Guo's Chasing Haze and she would probably be the real leader. In the tenth server Lord Grim was the guild leader, at least in name, with Chen Guo's avatar as second in command. Back then this arrangement was made to get more attention – Lord Grim was famous, so people wanted to be part of _his_ guild, consequently he had to stay the guild leader. Nowadays only the first wave of guild members seemed to care about Lord Grim, which was unsurprising, since the rest either hadn't been around during Lord Grim's reign – during his tyranny – or hadn't really understood how amazing he was. Seven Filed and Sleeping Moon were core players of the guild and helped the new players to navigate around and explain various thing to them. Ye Xiu hoped that those two could do the same in the new server for the first few weeks or so – while mainly focusing on the tenth server. Club guilds had the man power to split their attention to different servers without being weak in one, but Happy wasn't a club guild. They were just a bunch of normal players and consequently they lacked manpower and structure. If Muqiu had thought about it a little bit more, he would definitely question Ye Xiu about this, since there was no real need for a player guild to exist in different servers and to put so much effort into this. However, Muqiu didn't think any further. For him it was clear that Ye Xiu had something planned, but he couldn't think of what this might be – maybe it was something related to Glory, maybe not and maybe it was related to his boss or maybe not. Chen Guo still seemed to be the only one, who was overly enthusiastic about all this.  
With a click, Muqiu opened his friend list and saw that Walking Disaster and Pretty Little Psycho were both online. They hadn't reached level twenty yet, but they weren't too far away. Yifan had leveled up during the early morning hours of his shift, during the afternoon part of his shift it became harder and harder to get anything done, since more and more costumers had come. Therefore he had to stop playing at some point and Muqiu had only woken up in the late afternoon, so there was enough time for those two to catch up a little bit.

* * *

 **Pretty Little Psycho** : Good afternoon! Where are you and One Inch Ash? Running dungeons without you two is kinda annoying.

 **Autumn Colors** : Good afternoon. I am in front of Frost Forest and One Inch Ash is probably still in bed. He will be back at night, I guess. Hurry up and get to level twenty so we can take down the dungeon record for Frost Forest. Are you with Walking Disasters?

 **Pretty Little Psycho** : Yup! We're together!

While typing down his reply, Muqiu received another message.

 **Walking Disaster** : Good afternoon.

 **Autumn Colors** : Good afternoon. I heard, you and Pretty Little Psycho are together running a dungeon.

 **Walking Disaster** : That's right. However, without you and One Inch Ash, things are a bit harder. By the way, Red Jewel is with us as well.

 **Autumn Colors** : Red Jewel?

 **Walking Disaster** : Our fifth player yesterday.

* * *

Muqiu remembered their fifth member. A future Blade Master that was quite talkative – by far not as bad as Steamed Bun or Huang Shaotian, but still quite talkative. Since they hadn't sent each other a friend request, they couldn't see whether the other one was online.

* * *

 **Autumn Colors** : Have you settled for a class yet?

 **Walking Disaster** : Not really.

 **Autumn Colors** : If you need some advice, don't be shy.

 **Walking Disaster** : Okay.

With this the conversation between them ended for now. Going back to his chat with Pretty Little Psycho, he wasn't sure what to reply anymore.

 **Autumn Colors** : That's good. Just talked to her. The three of you should level up, change class and then come to the Frost Forest. I will introduce you to some of my friends.

 **Pretty Little Psycho** : Roger that!

 **Autumn Colors** : Ah! And don't join any other guild than Happy!

 **Pretty Little Psycho** : Okay…

* * *

Did this come off as strange? He just didn't want to lose those three to another guild. The three great guilds and the not-so-great- anymore guild Excellent Dynasty had more than enough experts on their side, they didn't need another three! However, Happy was a small guild in need! Three great players were like Christmas and birthday together for them. Of course, he couldn't force them and after knowing each other for less than a day it actually might come across as strange that he made such a statement. However, said was said, so he couldn't take back his words anymore. Somehow Muqiu had the feeling that Pretty Little Psycho wouldn't think too much of this and it was only him fussing about it – if it had been Walking Disaster, he might not even had said it in the first place.  
During his conversation with the two girls, Muqiu saw that Seven Filed and Sleeping Moon came online – Ye Xiu's Fallen Leaves was also on.

Since Ye Xiu and Muqiu were sitting next to each other, they could look at each other's monitors. Usually the computers were separated by a screen, so every costumer had their privacy. However those screens could be taken away, which Muqiu and Ye Xiu had done before, because it was more convenient for them to see each other's monitors, also it felt strange to not see each other, while sitting next to each other and chatting.  
"Why are you in the dungeon without me?", Muqiu asked.  
"Because you were busy with admiring your avatar and chatting with your new friends. You can play with Concealed Light and Little Cold Hands, those two shouldn't be too far away from you."  
"Have they reached level twenty?"  
Since both Concealed Light's Luo Ji and Little Cold Hands' An Wenyi were the first that had logged off, they were far behind everyone else.  
"Almost."  
Muqiu "humphed" and turned back to his own monitor. Soft Mist, One Inch Ash and Chasing Haze were both offline. Seven Field, Sleeping Moon and Fallen Leaves were in a dungeon together. Concealed Light and Little Cold Hands were not level twenty yet. The only other person that he could team up with was Steamed Bun Invasion. With a quick look he saw that Steamed Bun was online, so he wrote the other one a message.

* * *

 **Autumn Colors** : Where are you?

 **Steamed Bun Invasion** : Arena!

 **Autumn Colors** : Want to team up and go through Frost Forest?

 **Steamed Bun Invasion** : Um, boss said I shouldn't level too much.

* * *

With "boss" Steamed Bun referred to Ye Xiu, who had to stop Steamed Bun in the tenth server from leveling too fast, since otherwise they couldn't set a record. A dungeon record could only be made by a party of players in the same level range as the dungeon. So for Frost Forest the players of a party had to be between level twenty and level twenty-five. If one of the players inside the group was above twenty-five the system would not accept the "new" record. And everyone under level twenty was not even able to enter the dungeon in the first place. This time Ye Xiu had only reminded Steamed Bun to rest, but didn't say he had to stop leveling. At the moment everyone was about the same level, so there was no problem with Steamed Bun Invasion going through a dungeon.

* * *

 **Autumn Colors** : It's fine. We're all the same level. If you don't dungeon than you will fall behind.

 **Steamed Bun Invasion** : Oh! Then I'm coming.

* * *

Muqiu send his coordinates to Steamed Bun and then took a look around Frost Forest. As the name indicated Frost Forest was a forest, the surrounding were partly covered in white and if it was possible to feel something, the player would probably also freeze – but since this wasn't possible the cold could only be shown through some snow. The forest itself was a leveling area, which meant that players could come here and fight against monsters – in this case those monsters were blue skinned goblins. Inside the forest was the dungeon, which could be entered through different gates, because only having one way in and out was not convenient at all. It would be similar to the beginner village, where it was almost impossible to navigate around, due to the large number of players.  
Although the monsters inside the dungeon were at the dungeon's highest level, in this case level twenty-five, and dying cost experience and there was the chance to drop equipment, many players tried their luck right away – later when the player got stronger more and more would challenge the dungeon. For new players it was the safest to kill the goblins outside of the dungeon, which ranged from level twenty to level twenty-five, depending on how deep the person went into the forest.

"What about Yifan?", Muqiu suddenly asked.  
Since everyone was around the same level, One Inch Ash would fall behind, if no one took care of it, while Yifan was resting.  
"We will drag him along."  
"How?"  
Ye Xiu turned his head and looked at Muqiu. Luckily, Fallen Leaves was not alone or else the monster would have ripped him apart, while the person in control was staring at his friend as if said friend had just said the unspeakable, the unthinkable. In some way Muqiu had done it. It may not be possible to play with two account at the same computer, but one could play with two accounts on different computers. So all they had to do, was log into Glory on another computer, enter One Inch Ash's card and have him enter the dungeon together with Muqiu's avatar. All that had to be done then, was to move One Inch Ash along the way, so he always near to also reap the experiences of killing monsters. This way he would level up without actually playing. Yifan had done the same the entire morning with the different avatars. How could Muqiu not know about this method?  
"Standard method?", Ye Xiu answered hesitantly.  
"Yeah, but how?"  
Muqiu stared blankly at Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu stared back. The seconds passed by without them saying anything until Ye Xiu went back to his screen and continued with his dungeon. More seconds passed and Muqiu was unsure what to do. Did his friend decided to ignore him, because the other one thought he was an idiot? How could he not know about the standard method? He may have never used it, because there never had been any need to, but he had played Glory for over ten years by now! His problem was the fact that for this method they need another computer right next to them, but the internet café was quite packed. During the late afternoon and early evening the Internet Café had the most costumers, it was already hard for Muqiu and Ye Xiu to find a place to sit for themselves. Furthermore the costumers had priority, so when a costumer wanted to use the computer, they had to leave. Yifan didn't have that problem in the morning, because he sat at the reception, which had two computers. No costumer would sit there and switching between the game and the desktop was no problem – moreover the early morning hours had the fewest costumers, so Yifan got barely disturbed. There was no way Muqiu could do the same at the moment.  
"Shouldn't we also help Tang Rou?"  
Tang Rou was currently at the reception desk and busy with taking care of the costumers. She barely had time to play Glory. If they helped Yifan and Tang Rou than they would need two extra computers, which meant they needed a total of four computers – at the peak time of costumers this was not possible.  
Finally also Ye Xiu seemed to catch up. Until now he never had this problem, because everyone was playing in the Heavenly Domain with their maxed out accounts. Leveling wasn't important anymore. During the time in the normal server Yifan had someone else power level for him, Tang Rou and Steamed Bun were usually on when Lord Grim was on and Mucheng played whenever it was convenient, later when Muqiu joint they could help each other out. There was no need for them to drag someone along to level.

After finishing the dungeon, Ye Xiu turned around to face Muqiu again and let out a soft "Oh". Who had thought that he was capable of such a soft sound? Muqiu hadn't.  
"We can use the room upstairs."  
Upstairs were the VIP rooms. Costumers could book such a room and play together with their friends. One of these rooms was now booked out for the founding members of guild Happy. Stealing wild bosses was safer inside their private room. Many costumers of the Internet Café were fans of team Excellent Era and part of the guild Excellent Dynasty – if they knew that the Internet Café had its own guild and caused trouble for Excellent Dynasty, who knew how this would end. Honestly, it was a bit surprising the regular costumers didn't catch up, since all of them knew that Chen Guo was Chasing Haze and that she was a fan of Excellent Era – more particular a fan of Su Mucheng – and that she had left Excellent Dynasty a while ago. Inside the guild she also had many friends – she was not a well-known member or anything special, but she was there for a long time and had made many contacts – so her leaving wasn't unnoticed. Yet no one questioned her in person or stopped coming. Maybe Chen Guo had already been forgotten.  
Without any further delay, Muqiu and Ye Xiu logged out and went to the reception desk. There they got Tang Rou's and Yifan's account cards and went upstairs, where they logged into the game again. Steamed Bun had finally arrived at the coordination Muqiu had send him. Soft Mist and One Inch Ash were also there.  
"How do we split the team?"  
"Um, Seven Field and I will take Soft Mist. You should take One Inch Ash, Steamed Bun and Little Moon Moon", Ye Xiu suggested.  
The reason behind his suggestion was quite simple. Even after playing for a year, Steamed Bun still was unstable and would suddenly make mistakes that only a noob would do, so he still needed someone to look after him. One Inch Ash wouldn't do anything, so he needed to be protected. Taking care of two avatars, while killing monsters was a bit much, even for someone as skilled as Muqiu, so Sleeping Moon, who was called Little Moon Moon by his "friends", had to provide some steady support. Sleeping Moon was just a veteran and couldn't really be called an expert, but he was a steady player and over the past year he also had improved a bit, especially in the knowledge department. Seven Field was like Sleeping Moon and there was no need to talk about Ye Xiu. The only one in their group that was no good at the moment was Soft Mist, since no one would control her besides Ye Xiu to move her along. It probably would still be better to have a full group of five people, but at the moment they didn't have that many people. Maybe they could call someone from the guild over? Partying up with some random player would be no good. Or they simply waited for Concealed Light and Little Cold Hands to reach level twenty – Pretty Little Psycho, Walking Disaster and Red Jewel should reach level twenty soon as well. Then they would be more than enough people.  
"Alright, then let's go."

When running a dungeon for leveling, a player tried to kill every dungeon monster. When running a dungeon for a record, a player tried to avoid as many monsters a possible. Muqiu belong to the first category at the moment. In a group every member would gain experience, so as long as the avatar was within a certain range, he could gain experience without doing anything. With this method Muqiu parked One Inch Ash at a more or less safe place and started killing monsters. Every now and then he had to move One Inch Ash. It took them longer, but this was the only way to ensure that everyone was around the same level. At the end for Muqiu's second run through the dungeon, Red Jewel and Pretty Little Psycho had reach level twenty and changed classes. To change classes one had to fulfill a quest, which wasn't too hard. If it were, Glory wouldn't be so popular. However, there were always players that had trouble with these quests. When he didn't see Walking Disaster, Muqiu immediately wondered, whether she had problem with the quest. Should he ask? Better not. What if she felt ashamed because of it? Also one didn't have to change classes at all. After reach level twenty a player could change classes whenever he wanted. So when a player wanted to play without a class – this was called unspecialized – then they could do so as long as they wanted to. Therefore, changing classes, for example, at level 30 was possible.  
Luckily he didn't have to ponder over it for long. Pretty Little Psycho and Red Jewel had joint his group and Steamed Bun had been pushed to Ye Xiu. Halfway through his third run, Muqiu received a message from Walking Disaster that she now had changed class and asked for his whereabouts. Muqiu immediately answered her and reminded her to join guild Happy – a long pause had followed, which ended with her admitting that she had no clue how to join a guild. She also couldn't find a guide for it. There were many posts about, which guild to join, but none on how this was done. After explaining it to her, he received a crying emoji as answer and a few moments later Walking Disaster waited to be accepted by the guild leader of guild Happy.

Frost Forest had a daily entry limit of four times. Muqiu had used three of them already, while the other two had used up two of them. Walking Disaster still had all four.  
"Safe one run for later, so we can set the record", Ye Xiu reminded his friend.  
Later was, when Tang Rou and Qiao Yifan were playing their avatars. There was no way anyone would beat a record set by guild Happy's main force. Maybe it was a bit exaggerated, since they were merely at level twenty and their equipment was quite lacking. Normally the final record was set at level twenty-five. At this level the avatars would gain no skills and new and better equipment could be used. For the big guilds it was no problem to get many strong level twenty-five equipment for their record team, but for a small guild like Happy this was a bit troublesome.

Since Muqiu couldn't use his Sharpshooter now, he talked Chen Guo into giving him her Chasing Haze. Cheng Guo definitely wouldn't pull all-nighters and during the day she was busy with the Internet Café, so she would probably fall behind very fast and play with the rest only from time to time. Yet, for now this was good, since he could now use her account with its four dungeon runs. Concealed Light and Little Cold Hands also finally reached level twenty and changed classes. Little Cold Hands was once again a Cleric – this time a male one – and Concealed Light a Summoner.  
Muqiu's group now was put together by Red Jewel, Pretty Little Psycho, Walking Disaster and Little Cold Hands. As Cleric the latter hadn't had it easy in Ye Xiu's group, especially when it came down to setting dungeon records. Only later in the higher level dungeons and the one where more than five players were needed, would a Cleric be of need.  
The dungeon runs went smoothly and they got quite some good items – this was relatively speaking, since the lower levels were passed quickly and no one was interested in low leveled equipment. This kind of stuff would find its way into the guild's storage. At a later time a guild would start setting up the guild's storage. This storage could be used for trading items. The guild members could put items, they had gained, into the storage and receive points for it – common and low leveled items would give less points than rare and high leveled items – and after gaining a certain amount of points the player could exchange those points for an item from the guild storage – the common and low leveled items needed less points than the rare and high leveled items. This system was one of the big advantages club guilds had over normal player guilds! The chances to get a strong weapon or good equipment was higher.

When it was time for Ye Xiu to get on his shift, Muqiu also logged out. Chen Guo wanted to show him, how work was down at the Internet Café and he also needed to sign his contract. Yifan was also back at the Internet Café and helped Chen Guo to explain Muqiu his new duties. The work as an Internet Café Manager wasn't anything special or hard, yet one had to deal with other people, so one needed to know how to handle others and what to do, when a problem arose. After their little tour Chen Guo went to bed, Ye Xiu sat at the reception desk and Muqiu left together with Yifan and Tang Rou to their little gaming room. Now it was time to set a record. Steamed Bun, Soft Mist, Fallen Leaves, Autumn Colors and Concealed Light were selected for this duty. One Inch Ash and Little Cold Hand partied with Seven Field and Sleeping Moon. Those four weren't after the record, but after items and experience. Muqiu's little group of newly made friends, on the other hand, had no entries left and did their own thing. Pretty Little Psycho wanted to try her assassin out in the arena. Red Jewel and Walking Disaster went back to the lower leveled dungeons. Walking Disaster wanted to get more familiar and used to her Warlock, while Red Jewel simply wanted to kill a few more monsters and the ones inside a dungeon were more challenging than those outside – also there was no reason to not help Walking Disaster.

This way everyone was doing their thing and nothing much happened, besides a record set by guild Happy causing a major headache to a certain guild leader, who was already writing down his resignation from the position of leader guilder in the new server – he had made it clear from the very beginning that he would leave as soon as trouble arose and Ye Xiu was trouble! That guy was major trouble! Trouble wasn't enough to describe what that guy was! That man was a disaster! Blue River, also known as Xu Boyuan, was the guild leader of Blue Brook Guild in the eleventh server – formerly guild leader of the tenth server Blue Brook guild – and he was so done with Ye Xiu and the rest of guild Happy's main force. Guild Happy didn't bring Happiness to anyone! They brought disaster, despair, destruction, misfortune, shame and many headaches upon others!


End file.
